american author and humorist Mark Twain (1835-1910) wrote the following essay near the end of his
life, around 1900, although the passage was not published until 1923, thirteen years after his death.
Read the passage carefully. Then, in a well-organized essay, analyze the rhetorical strategies Twain
uses to establish his position on the nature of patriotism.
It is agreed, in this country, that if a man can arrange his religion so that it perfectly satisfies his
conscience, it is not incumbent upon him to care whether the arrangement is satisfactory to any one
else or not.
In Austria and some other countries this is not the case. There the State arranges a man's religion
for him, he has no voice in it himself.
Patriotism is merely a religion -- love of country, worship of country, devotion to the country's flag
and honor and welfare.
In absolute monarchies it is furnished from the Throne, cut and dried, to the subject; in England and
America it is furnished, cut and dried, to the citizen by the politician and the newspaper.
The newspaper-and-politician-manufactured Patriot often gags in private over his dose; but he takes
it, and keeps it on his stomach the best he can. Blessed are the meek.
Sometimes, in the beginning of an insane and shabby political upheaval, he is strongly moved to
revolt, but he doesn't do it -- he knows better. He knows that his maker would find it out -- the maker
of his Patriotism, the windy and incoherent six-dollar sub-editor of his village newspaper -- and would
bray out in print and call him a Traitor. And how dreadful that would be. It makes him tuck his tail
between his legs and shiver. We all know -- the reader knows it quite well -- that two or three years
ago nine-tenths of the human tails in England and America performed just that act. Which is to say,
nine-tenths of the Patriots in England and America turned Traitor to keep from being called Traitor.
Isn't it true? You know it to be true. Isn't it curious?
Yet it was not a thing to be very seriously ashamed of. A man can seldom -- very, very seldom --
fight a winning fight against his training; the odds are too heavy. For many a year -- perhaps always
-- the training of the two nations had been dead against independence in political thought,
persistently inhospitable toward Patriotism manufactured on a man's own premises, Patriotism
reasoned out in the man's own head and fire-assayed and tested and proved in his own conscience.
The resulting Patriotism was a shop-worn product procured at second hand. The Patriot did not
know just how or when or where he got his opinions, neither did he care, so long as he was with
what seemed the majority -- which was the main thing, the safe thing, the comfortable thing. Does
the reader believe he knows three men who have actual reasons for their pattern of Patriotism -- and
can furnish them? Let him not examine, unless he wants to be disappointed. He will be likely to find
that his men got their Patriotism at the public trough, and had no hand in their preparation
themselves.
Training does wonderful things. It moved the people of this country to oppose the Mexican war; then
moved them to fall in with what they supposed was the opinion of the majority -- majority-Patriotism
is the customary Patriotism -- and go down there and fight. Before the Civil War it made the North
life, around 1900, although the passage was not published until 1923, thirteen years after his death.
Read the passage carefully. Then, in a well-organized essay, analyze the rhetorical strategies Twain
uses to establish his position on the nature of patriotism.
It is agreed, in this country, that if a man can arrange his religion so that it perfectly satisfies his
conscience, it is not incumbent upon him to care whether the arrangement is satisfactory to any one
else or not.
In Austria and some other countries this is not the case. There the State arranges a man's religion
for him, he has no voice in it himself.
Patriotism is merely a religion -- love of country, worship of country, devotion to the country's flag
and honor and welfare.
In absolute monarchies it is furnished from the Throne, cut and dried, to the subject; in England and
America it is furnished, cut and dried, to the citizen by the politician and the newspaper.
The newspaper-and-politician-manufactured Patriot often gags in private over his dose; but he takes
it, and keeps it on his stomach the best he can. Blessed are the meek.
Sometimes, in the beginning of an insane and shabby political upheaval, he is strongly moved to
revolt, but he doesn't do it -- he knows better. He knows that his maker would find it out -- the maker
of his Patriotism, the windy and incoherent six-dollar sub-editor of his village newspaper -- and would
bray out in print and call him a Traitor. And how dreadful that would be. It makes him tuck his tail
between his legs and shiver. We all know -- the reader knows it quite well -- that two or three years
ago nine-tenths of the human tails in England and America performed just that act. Which is to say,
nine-tenths of the Patriots in England and America turned Traitor to keep from being called Traitor.
Isn't it true? You know it to be true. Isn't it curious?
Yet it was not a thing to be very seriously ashamed of. A man can seldom -- very, very seldom --
fight a winning fight against his training; the odds are too heavy. For many a year -- perhaps always
-- the training of the two nations had been dead against independence in political thought,
persistently inhospitable toward Patriotism manufactured on a man's own premises, Patriotism
reasoned out in the man's own head and fire-assayed and tested and proved in his own conscience.
The resulting Patriotism was a shop-worn product procured at second hand. The Patriot did not
know just how or when or where he got his opinions, neither did he care, so long as he was with
what seemed the majority -- which was the main thing, the safe thing, the comfortable thing. Does
the reader believe he knows three men who have actual reasons for their pattern of Patriotism -- and
can furnish them? Let him not examine, unless he wants to be disappointed. He will be likely to find
that his men got their Patriotism at the public trough, and had no hand in their preparation
themselves.
Training does wonderful things. It moved the people of this country to oppose the Mexican war; then
moved them to fall in with what they supposed was the opinion of the majority -- majority-Patriotism
is the customary Patriotism -- and go down there and fight. Before the Civil War it made the North
